3 July 2009 - East of Northport, Washington

We are in a groove. Twenty miles is coming much easier each day. We have scaled countless mountains and have walked numerous anonymous roads and trails. As I grow accustomed to the long days and the climbing, I feel more certain that this is a life I could live. Not even half way into this journey, and I am thinking of future potential routes to walk.

Nothing is more basic than hiking. You rest when you are tired, and you stop when you find a nice spot. There is no concern of property. I am losing any hesitancy to just camp anywhere. For example, tonight we are camped amongst the ruins of an old ranch. I imagine this is public land, but even if it isn't, I doubt anyone else will pass through this area for weeks. Who should care if someone puts up a tent and enjoys a view?

Today we hiked a rural road that despite being public was gated off. Near the end of the road was an apparent spring. Being another scorching day, I set off into some brush to find the spring. I heard some water flopping--which I assumed was the spring spurting out from the ground at an uneven tempo. There I saw the bush move. I stopped approaching the spring, and a moment later, a bull moose came running out of the bushes. He ran up a hill away from us, and then we all sat and stared at each other. He eventually grew bored of our staring contest and retreated into the woods.

26 June 2009 - NW of Bonners Ferry

Yesterday we resupplied in Bonners Ferry, and today we are back heading NW. We will have roughly 150 miles to cover in the next seven days before we get to our next town to stock up. Our bags are wegihted down with a weeks worth of food. In this next week, I don't anticipate that we will encounter many people. We have yet to meet anyone hiking yet.

We are all getting so acclimated with living out in the wilderness with the fresh air that last night in a hotel was difficult. The air felt so stale and the artificial lights felt articifical. It is nice to be out in the fresh air again. It's also nice to see some wildlife. Today we passed through a National Wildlife Resrve and a Nature Conservacy Reserve and entered into a new National Forest. In the process we saw a mosse and many deer, primarily from afar.